Because not every fox is meant to be hunted
by Hinata Plusle
Summary: Arthur loved hunting foxes. Well, perhaps something would change after... That. Written for Asakiku Secret Santa 2013 on tumblr. Sufin as a side-pairing.


Written in early 2014 for watery21 on tumblr. Prompts used were "England with Kitsune Japan" and "Asakiku with Sealand (family moment)". There's Sufin, but as a side-ship (because I can't avoid them, sorry).

—

Arthur loved hunting foxes. Following their traces, watching the foxhounds chase them, tiring them out (usually by foot, as he preferred), and even seeing the blood oozing from them when he decided on killing the animal… Everything in it was thrilling and exciting. Many men he knew only hunted to "fulfill their duties", but it was not his case. And it was also a nice way to forget for a moment that his son Peter was growing up without a mum. Peter also seemed to like it, as he always asked to go hunting with him.

And now, he had successfully chased a fox and killed it. Peter cheered, happy with the frantic chase he had just watched. Arthur petted the foxhounds and took a few parts of the now dead fox, before throwing the rest back to his dogs, who promptly dug in and even fought a bit for the meat. After watching them a bit and concluding that it wouldn't be dangerous to leave the foxhounds for a minute, the older man approached his son and smiled.

"Today's hunt was fun."

"Awesome! When are you going to let me hunt on my own?"

"It'll take a bit long. You're too young yet."

Peter pouted.

"You meanie."

"You know it's for your safety. Mum wouldn't like to see you getting hurt."

Arthur intended to keep the conversation going, but he suddenly saw a beautiful fox, trying to hide away in a corner where just barely seconds ago there was nothing. And by beautiful, he meant _absolutely gorgeous._The fox had a somewhat different fur color, still red, but not quite the same as usual. It walked almost in a perky way, but still careful. The fox's most outstanding feature, however, was it intense gaze, a piercing stare, with a tiny bit of defiance. He definitely wasn't going to see another fox like that again if he let it flee.

Arthur didn't hesitate: he gathered the foxhounds (who had just finished with the other fox) and started chasing the beautiful fox. However, said fox wasn't only beautiful: it was way smarter than any other foxes he had ever seen. In a matter of minutes, it had fled and none of his dogs seemed to know where it had gone to. Utterly upset, Arthur went back home, feeling like he had missed a once-in-lifetime opportunity.

Which means when he saw the same fox again the next day, just before dusk, Arthur couldn't believe his own eyes.

He hadn't brought any foxhounds that day, but decided to silently follow the fox, at the same pace it walked. After a few minutes, however, the fox simply disappeared in front of him. No, it did not run away. It simply went "poof" and suddenly was nowhere to be seen. Arthur was now convinced that either that fox wasn't normal or he was going nuts (as his son had been claiming for quite a long time).

But he didn't have time to wonder much about it. Suddenly Arthur realized that his chase of a few minutes hadn't really lasted a few minutes. It was already dark, the sky was an eerie black. And worse, he hadn't brought anything to light up his way (since his original plan was to be back home before dusk) and the moon wasn't anywhere in the sky (damn new moon!).

Arthur was already half trying to find shelter to spend the night and half panicking when a dim light appeared from behind a tree a few feet from where he was. Then a person holding… A red paper lamp?… Came to him. Oh. So that weird thing he held was the source of the light. Arthur didn't even bother trying to understand where the man had come from. Nothing was making sense anymore. And the light was dim; it was not like he'd able to find out anything even if he tried.

The man spoke with a soft voice and broken English (along with a strong and different accent – Arthur wasn't able to recognize where he had come from):

"You… Lost."

Arthur raised an eyebrow.

"Yes, I'm lost. And…?"

The man motioned to hand him the weird paper lamp.

"Use this… Home."

Now wide-eyed, Arthur pointed a finger to himself.

"You mean… This is for me?"

The man simply nodded.

"Why, thank you! How can I return your help?"

"No need… Home…"

Arthur thankfully got the paper lamp and tried going back home. However, it seemed only one wasn't going to help.

"Sorry for the trouble, but can you give me one more lamp?"

The man nodded and handed one more lamp, which Arthur couldn't find out where he had taken from.

"So… Goodbye, and thank you! Someday I'll repay your kindness!"

This wasn't a lie. Arthur definitely didn't fancy spending a whole night in the woods and in the dark. Whoever his savior was, he was actually thankful for the help.

And so, Arthur walked back home. He entered his hose, where Peter had been waiting worriedly. The boy ran to his father and glomped him as soon as he came inside.

"Dad! Where have you been?"

"Sorry, Peter. I got lost and had a bit of trouble getting back home."

"Tino had made Swedish food. It was so yummy! But now it's cold…"

"Sorry for missing the meal. Ah, and thank you for putting a part aside for me, Tino."

"No problem. Wouldn't let you go to bed starving, would I?"

Tino (one of the two servants at the Kirkland household) smiled.

"I hope you don't mind the Swedish food. Peter wanted it so bad."

"I should be angry for you spoiling him, but the food indeed looks very tasty. For now, please put these… Lamps out."

Arthur handed the paper lamps to Tino, who stared at them a bit.

"Where did you get them?"

"A man gave them to me."

"There was a man in the woods and he just gave you these weird things?"

"They got me home, right?"

"Well…"

Arthur sat at the table to have dinner and Tino went out to put the lamps out. Peter followed Tino, seemingly having nothing to do.

When the two got out, however, they saw really weird small yellow flowers. They looked at each other, at the flowers and back at each other, wide-eyed.

"Peter… These flowers weren't here until a few minutes ago, were they?"

"No…"

Definitely, there was something up.

—

That fox did not appear anymore. Arthur had already lost hope finding and hunting it.

But it didn't mean he had forgotten it, which made hunting other foxes quite pointless. That was the only explanation he had for having decided not to kill the fox he had just chased.

Arthur got home by dusk, only to find a lot of wood spread in front of the entrance.

"What's going on here?"

Berwald (the other servant), who apparently was the only one outside, answered:

"Pet'r ask'd for a new desk. 'M choosin' the best logs."

"You're going to make one?"

Berwald only nodded. Arthur knew his silence wasn't necessarily a sign that he was in a bad mood. He went inside, where Tino was setting up the table for dinner.

"Ah, Mr. Kirkland! Welcome back! I hope you had a good hunting day!"

Removing his coat, Arthur sat at the table.

"Yeah, it was fun. I chased a fox, but decided on letting it go."

Even Peter, who had just gotten to the kitchen, was agape.

"You let it go? Are you sure nothing has happened, Mr. Kirkland?"

"Yeah, why the question?"

"N-nothing, please forget it."

—

It was a sunny day. Perfect for having lunch outside.

That was what Arthur had done with his family, in fact. Berwald had somehow convinced Tino to let him cook, instead of doing everything by himself. The food had been delicious. Nothing fancy, but that was exactly the kind of food he liked the most.

However, Tino had a lot of chores to do and soon went back home, followed by Peter. Berwald was gone not a minute later to collect firewood, as he knew they'd need a lot of it during winter and he wouldn't risk waiting for too long and not finding any later. It was already fall, after all. Arthur was left alone at the empty table.

He was almost going inside when he heard a distant cry of pain. It certainly wasn't a human screaming, but Arthur thought it was better to check. Turns out it was quite far. Arthur's legs were already hurting a bit when he got to the injured animal. He even wondered how in the world he'd been able to hear the cry.

It was a fox. Not that beautiful fox he had seen a few weeks before, but a fox nonetheless.

Arthur would usually let it die or simply kill it to cut off its suffering, but somehow he could not bring himself to do this now. He then decided to take care of its wounds. The fox was a bit weak, so it did not protest much. Arthur ripped a piece of cloth from his shirt and used it as a makeshift bandage. A few minutes later, he was done. The fox got up and went away.

Damn, he was getting too soft-hearted. He shouldn't tell anyone about this, or they'd make fun of him to no end. Arthur got up to go back home. It was pretty far away, although nothing that he couldn't walk at once.

But he then realized: the sun was setting. Apparently, he had lost track of time again.

He had already been quite lucky when a man had come from nowhere and given him some weird paper lamps. Arthur knew he wasn't that lucky to get help like that again. He was already searching for shelter, even though the sun hadn't completely set – he knew he'd never get out of the woods before everything became pitch black.

But well, sometimes life just didn't make any sense.

There was that weak light again. Coming from behind a tree again.

Then a man came from behind the trees again, but he just handed a lamp wordlessly.

Arthur took it. Unlike the ones from last time, though, the light was really strong. He was almost getting home when he stumbled on a stone.

Well, not really a stone.

It was a gold coin! Well, a really weird gold coin, but a gold coin nonetheless.

Arthur looked back and realized that there were coins like that the entire way from where he had gotten the paper lamp. And more: if he shook the paper lamp, more coins would fall from it!

Definitely, there was something up about that man. However, Arthur realized, it didn't seem it was for bad, so he just shrugged and started collecting the coins.

—

It turns out there was an enormous amount of gold in those coins. After first collecting them, Arthur had thought they were made of any other material for the stunning amount of coins he had collected. There was no way it all could be actually golden.

Which means he almost fainted when he discovered they were almost pure gold.

Arthur saved almost all the gold, presumably to pay for Peter's studies (Peter was young, but Arthur had high expectations for him) and avoid future financial trouble.

And the rest… Arthur bought some rum, gin and a few other drinks he knew Tino liked.

But not only that. He did a thing he'd been dreaming of for years: building one more room at his house.

The reason behind that was quite simple.

Arthur's family had never really been that rich. Still richer than most, but definitely not the epitome of wealth. It meant his house only had three bedrooms: one that had belonged to his (now deceased) parents and later to him and his (now deceased) wife, one that had been his and later became Peter's, and a guest room. Tino and Berwald had never had a room for themselves. Even though they weren't actual relatives, Arthur thought of them as family and it really upset him to see those two turning thirty, having lived there for over half their lives, and still sleeping in the attic. He had once offered the guest room for them to take permanently, but they had promptly refused, claiming that "the attic was perfectly fine and Mr. Kirkland would need the room later". The only way he'd get them a room would be building one for them. They tried to stop Arthur several times, but didn't succeed. Now Arthur had the money; nothing would stop him.

And a few weeks later, the Kirklands owned a house with not three, but four bedrooms. "Mr. Kirkland" had enough money to build separate rooms for Tino and Berwald, but apparently they had spent so much time sharing a bedroom that they simply couldn't think of having it another way. Not only that, but building one more room would be quite troublesome: he'd have to do lots of changes to other parts of the house, and Tino had promptly refused to let him do that.

Anyway, Arthur was happy. Who wouldn't be on his shoes? Building the extra bedroom had been kind of a personal life goal, even. Arthur had been careful to make sure it wouldn't feel like an extra makeshift room, but a real comfortable bedroom with a homey feeling, like Berwald had once in a very distant past claimed he'd want his bedroom to be if he ever came to have one.

However, one could note that it had been quite long since it had last rained during daytime. Even though it rained a lot where he lived, not a single drop had fallen from the sky while the sun was still there for the last weeks, maybe months. Peter was particularly upset with it, as the boy loved rainbows.

Well, it couldn't be helped. Peter would have to wait.

—

Winter was coming. The trees now didn't have a single leaf left on them (except for the pines). It was getting colder and colder. Several animal species were getting ready to hibernate.

Arthur wasn't worried. They were ready for it, like every year. Berwald had collected insane amounts of firewood. Tino had made lots of dry food and stored enough water. Arthur had made sure to buy a few books and toys for Peter (the boy could be quite annoying if bored). Yes, they were ready for winter. As long as nobody else came.

Arthur slapped himself at the thought. Why would someone come here now? They lived three days from the nearest village and at least a week from any actual city. Actually, Arthur even wondered from time to time how in the world Tino and Berwald had managed to get there several years before, running away from some nasty boss they had been obliged to work for. He was pretty sure he had no relatives left besides the ones living there – and no, his wife wasn't going to pop out at the front door, damn.

So, of course, Arthur almost had a heart attack when someone knocked on the door when he was almost going to bed during a snowy night – the first of many to come that season. Peter had been tucked in, Berwald was already in bed (and he could hear him snore a bit), Tino was right as his side cleaning the dinner table. Who the hell was it?

It was Tino who actually answered the door. Arthur followed closely behind.

"Hello? How can I help you?"

There was a man at the doorstep. He had pale skin and jet black hair. He was constantly staring at the floor, so Arthur couldn't quite see his eyes. His frame was small, almost feminine (and he was also really short – how could someone be even shorter than Tino?). There was a bit of snow on his shoulders, and he wore quite different clothes. Definitely a foreigner. But the man had nothing besides the clothes he was wearing (strangely).

"Lost… Stay…?"

The man spoke with a strong accent and broken English, but Arthur could understand what he meant. He had probably gotten lost and was looking for shelter. Tino apparently understood it too, as he looked at Arthur, waiting for an answer.

Well, he seemed harmless. And just one night would be okay, right?

"Okay, let him in, Tino. It's way too cold outside and I wouldn't want a dead man in front of my house tomorrow. Let him sleep in the guest room."

Tino motioned for the man to come in. He nodded and went in, still not raising his head. Arthur thought his shyness was even a bit funny.

"What is it, young man? It's not like we bite. You're our guest tonight. Feel yourself at home."

The man apparently didn't understand the words but had gotten what Arthur meant, because he started blushing madly and lowered his head even more.

Arthur couldn't help thinking how cute it was – even though cute wasn't really a compliment if given towards a man. Tino even scolded him a bit, telling him to stop teasing the poor man and let him rest.

—

Originally, the man was supposed to go the following day.

Well, it snowed heavily for the entire week. And the following one. And the other. It wasn't like the man could leave even if he wanted. Arthur decided to let him stay for as long as he wanted. After all, the man seemed harmless, was quiet and ate very little… Right? One or two more nights later, the man (whose name apparently was Kiku) decided to move to the attic. Nice, one more staying in the damn attic. What did it have that everybody seemed to love it so much?

Anyway, Kiku was soon a member of the family. Even though his English was initially broken, he learned it quite quickly. When his English got better, he managed to tell them that he was twenty-nine and was from a land even farther than China, a place he himself called "Nippon" and that Marco Polo had referred to as "Cipangu". Kiku even told tales from his land, which seemingly involved "tanuki" (a kind of dog) a lot. Peter seemed to love his stories, as he'd always eagerly listen to them until he fell asleep – while he usually wouldn't stay quiet for more than a minute at the same place.

When spring came, Kiku didn't leave. Peter had insisted that he stayed, and while more subtly, Tino also had. Apparently, the man from Nippon had nowhere to go (what in the world made the Kirklands' house so attractive for lost foreigners?), so he complied.

Arthur tried to convince him to move to the guest room, but the dark-haired man apparently was even more stubborn than the two previous inhabitants of the attic. Kiku claimed that "it would be taking advantage of Kirkland-san's kindness" and that "he should show gratitude by being the least of a burden he could". It didn't matter that Arthur had told him that the last visitor had come more than four years before (and it wasn't a lie). In fact, it seemed Kiku had grown up in quite a different environment than any of the others at that house. He believed that one's most valuable thing was honor, even beyond life itself, and was extremely uncomfortable with physical contact, even though his personal space was quite small. Yes, it meant Arthur could get quite close to him without making Kiku feel uncomfortable, but a simple tap on his shoulder would make him extremely nervous. He also had the strange habit of calling Peter "Peter-kun" and using "-san" after an adult's surname instead of "Mister" before it, even when speaking in English (which was pretty much all the time, as Kiku avoided speaking in his native language "in order not to be rude", according to himself). Kiku's tastes for food were also different: he claimed that most of the traditional food at his homeland used either soy, a rare thing in England, or "azuki", a thing he had never even heard of before.

Now, speaking of food. Kiku was good at cooking. It took him a while, but he learned how to make English food, Swedish food, and even adapted some "Nipponese" dishes to the tastes of the others and ingredients available in England. Peter seemed to love Kiku's sweetened beans, and Tino was happy to have a new cooking buddy.

Well, Kiku became Tino's partner for almost everything. They'd do almost all the chores at home together. Tino complained a lot that Kiku always did everything and never left anything for him, but somehow the dark-haired (and – now he knew – dark-eyed) man would always be able to wake up before everybody else and make breakfast just before Berwald (usually the first to wake up after him) got up. Oh, and he also was always the last to go to bed, because "he wouldn't be able to sleep well if he knew there were dirty dishes in the sink", or so he claimed. Kiku almost became like a fourth dad to Peter, and was the only who could keep the boy quiet. When he played with Peter, in fact, he almost sounded like a mother, always listening to whatever the boy said with genuine interest. Damn, he even was delicate like his beloved wife had been.

Arthur kicked himself at the thought. What was he thinking? Kiku was a man, and he didn't even know anything about him other than his name and his homeland!

But, truth be told, the short man was really cute while making paper ships with Peter and telling him stories about brave warriors or mischievous animals – even though Arthur knew he shouldn't call a man "cute".

—

"Hey, Kiku, did you have any relatives when you were in Nippon?"

Tino supposedly asked that innocently during just another dinner. However, Arthur had so much interest over Kiku's past that he couldn't hide it:

"Yes, we don't know anything besides your name and this homeland of yours."

Kiku seemed to be embarrassed, but started to say anyway:

"Well… I had… My parents used to work in a rice paddy, until they passed away when I was 10 years old. I spent about five years in an aunt's house, before she also passed away. Then, since I had nowhere to go, I decided to go with some traders to the Netherlands. If I went back to Nippon, I would be a criminal, so I decided on fleeing. After some time wandering about, I got here."

Everyone seemed to be confused about the "If I went back to Nippon, I would be a criminal" part. Peter asked:  
"Why a criminal?"

"Well, it is illegal for foreigners to enter Nippon or for Nipponese to leave it, except for really specific cases. I had some trouble entering the ship I took to the Netherlands, in fact. I had to bribe some traders."

Tino exclaimed:

"Wow, it seems you passed through a lot before getting here! It even reminds me of what Berwald and I had to do to run away from our former boss!"

Kiku seemed interested:

"What did you do?"

Tino started explaining.

"Well, we were…"

Arthur sighed. This was going to take long. But seeing Kiku listen to something so eagerly made him smile furtively at the man who still refused to wear anything besides those clothes he had brought when he first arrived there.

Then something clicked.

At the day he had first come, he wasn't carrying anything, right?

There was something off about this man, for sure…

—

Peter complained about not being able to see rainbows.

Arthur realized that it had been over half a year since it had last rained during daytime. It could rain cats and dogs at night, but as the sun rose, the sky would always be clear. Weirdly, it had last rained during daytime exactly a day before he had seen that beautiful fox. And, Arthur realized, since then he hadn't killed a single fox.

—

As the days passed, Arthur realized that his feelings for the small-framed man weren't the same ones he had for Tino, Berwald, or Peter anymore. They were much more like what he felt for his wife. Or, truth be told, had once felt for his wife.

It was not that he was forgetting his wife, no. He had paintings of her spread around the entire house. Peter head some resemblance to her (even though he looked much more like Arthur himself) and held her dearly, even though he couldn't actually remember her – well, nobody would expect him to remember. Peter was barely six months old when she had passed away.

It was more accurate to say she was slowly becoming a memory instead of something actually living in that house. Arthur could recall the first months after her death. They had been terrible. He'd expected her to pop out at the front door, saying that she had just been gone for a walk. He'd asked for her opinion on his clothing choice before realizing that no, she wasn't going to give any advice. Even though Arthur hadn't been particularly surprised by her death, as he knew she wouldn't live for much long (she had been one of those people who always were sick and Peter's birth had been particularly damaging for her health), of course he had mourned her death a lot and still missed her.

But now, he'd think of her as a long lost friend, as a long lost lover. Someone loved dearly, but not part of his life anymore.

Arthur finally thought he was ready to move on.

There was only one "problem". The person who was slowly taking her place was a man – and a man he knew little to nothing about.

Arthur was sure he had once in a distant past heard about men loving other men, and it surely wasn't seen as something positive. It was probably considered a sin – like almost everything a person could do.

But then again, his family wasn't really religious. They barely went to church. They hardly ever celebrated religious holidays – truth be told, they only celebrated Christmas, and it was more because Tino loved the holiday than for actual religious reasons. In fact, Arthur even suspected that maybe his two servants weren't only good friends who had passed through a lot together in the past. So he shouldn't feel guilty for having that kind of feelings towards one of the same gender as him, right? Well, not only cute romantic feelings, but anyway.

"Arthur? Are you okay?"

Tino waved in front of him. Arthur suddenly snapped out of his daydreaming.

"W-what? Has something happened, Tino?"

"No, it's just that you've been staring at your food for more than ten minutes. Is something wrong with it? Kiku can cook something else if you don't like what I made. Or if you want to talk, I can listen."

"No, I'm fine, Tino. Thanks."

Tino didn't sound convinced, but shrugged off and decided to continue what he had been doing before – probably having a monologue by Berwald's side or playing with Peter (and getting his clothes dirty in the process).

Arthur got worried. Was it getting that obvious?

Well, he had to make up his mind and decide if he was going to say whatever he had to say soon!

—

Arthur got up to drink some water, as he did quite often. It was late at night. Peter was fast asleep in his room. Berwald also was, as Arthur could even hear him snoring a bit. Tino was nowhere to be seen, which means he was probably asleep too.

What he didn't expect was a few lamps of the house to be still lit.

It was probably Kiku, still doing the washing up or cleaning the kitchen, whatever he did every night. That being said, it was still weird. When Arthur woke up, Kiku was always in bed already.

When Arthur got to the kitchen, his suspicions were confirmed. Kiku was kneeling on the floor, cleaning it, and was seemingly almost done.

Arthur stayed silently at the doorway for a few minutes. Kiku didn't seem to notice him until he was actually finished with the cleaning and got up. Kiku was mildly surprised, but managed not to change his tone.

"Ah, Kirkland-san, are you awake?"

"I should be the one asking you that. You know, Tino can help you with these chores tomorrow. You don't have to tire yourself this much."

Kiku put the floor cloth he had been using away and got up.

"I do not mind the work, Kirkland-san."

"Still, you shouldn't work too much. You'll get sick if you keep working this much."

"I appreciate the thought, but I can assure you I have worked more than this for my entire life. I promise I will be fine, Kirkland-san."

Arthur suddenly realized that nobody else at that house was awake. Now was his chance to let Kiku know about his feelings for the Nipponese man. And, if everything went wrong, he could just pretend nothing had happened, as there would be no witnesses.

Yes, there wouldn't be a better chance than now.

"Kiku, can you please come to my room?"

Kiku seemed taken aback. He immediately got nervous and started stuttering.

"W-well, o-okay, Kirkland-san, but I h-have to put the l-lamps out…"

Kiku clumsily put the lamps in the kitchen out while Arthur waited for him, then the two silently went to Arthur's bedroom. As soon as both were there, Arthur closed the door behind it. The taller man sat on his bed, while the Nipponese stayed close to the door, staring at his feet. Arthur started regretting whatever he had intended to do when he had called the smaller man to his bedroom.

"Kiku, please look at me. I have to tell you a few things, and it won't work if you constantly keep your head down."

Kiku was madly blushing.

"Kirkland-san, I am not used to…"

"Kiku, do you even know what I'm going to do?"

"W-whatever you are going to do, it is probably something I-I am not used to. Your people are m-much more straightforward than mine, Kirkland-san."

"Maybe we are. But I think not being straightforward now will only make you even more nervous. Why make you wait, then?"

Arthur knew he was going to regret it, but got up and started walking towards Kiku. For each step forward Arthur took, Kiku took one back, until his back bumped against the door and he couldn't go any farther. Arthur soon had him pinned against the closed door, and the short man was almost passing out from embarrassment, his entire face as red as a tomato.

Arthur almost laughed at the other's nervousness. Kiku definitely wasn't used to this.

"So, Kiku, I think you have never been married, have you?"

"D-do I look like I h-have been, K-Kikland-san?"

Now Arthur couldn't help chuckling a bit.

"No, you definitely don't. In fact, I don't think you've ever been in a relationship, am I right?"

Still blushing, Kiku only managed to nod.

Bloody hell, he was definitely going to regret it. Why was he doing that? Anyway, Arthur got closer and seductively whispered at Kiku's ear.

"But, you know, I could change it. That's it, Kiku, I like you. I like you a lot, more than I should."

"W-what?!"

Arthur then pulled Kiku closer and laid his hands on the dark-haired man's back.

However, when the taller touched the dark-haired man's lower back, he felt something that shouldn't be there. Was it… A tail?

Kiku got desperate and shouted, while pushing Arthur away from him:

"Please stay away from me, Kirkland-san!"

For a few seconds, Arthur was stunned. A light surrounded Kiku and suddenly there was no Kiku anymore, but instead that beautiful fox Arthur had attempted to hunt a few months before was in his place.

"W-what? Kiku?"

The fox looked down at its own paws and whispered:

"I am sorry."

Then it proceeded to leave the room, but was stopped by Arthur, who on the spur of the moment locked the door and put the key inside one of his pockets. Once he did that, however, he was frozen in his tracks again.

"Kiku, I…"

The fox hissed under its breath.

"Are you surprised? You have just confessed to a fox!"

"…"

"It was not supposed to go like this. I think it has gone too far. But now that you know about my secret, I must leave. Would you please open the door? If you do not, I will have to leave through a window and will probably break it."

"But why?… Why did you do all of this?…"

Kiku still did not turn around.  
"Will I actually have to explain everything little by little, Arthur? I thought you were smarter. Truth is I am not a common fox. I am a 'kitsune', a Nipponese kind of fox, kind of a mythical figure. We can disguise ourselves as humans, create illusions and be invisible. We are also known in Nippon to be remarkably smart. We usually take advantage of our smartness to play tricks on humans, and a few of us have actually married human men and even given birth while disguised as women. I was intending to take advantage of your kindness. Even though you are not a fool, it actually seemed I would be able to get whatever I wanted and then just go away. You even spared a fox's life and helped another one just because you had been delighted by my beauty. But why do you have to be so different from the humans in my land?"

The fox was then surrounded by a weird light – but a different one from that of seconds ago – and transformed back to Kiku.

"Every kitsune who dares getting close to a human has agreed to a wordless 'no strings attached' policy. And I thought I would be able to comply with it. I thought it was going to be simple. I thought I would just buy your acceptance with my appearance, those chouchin and koban. Then I would get close as a human to explore the house and steal whatever I found valuable – and also play a bit with your heart. Finally, I would just leave without a guilty conscience, like I had seen many other kitsune do back at the times I was in Nippon."  
An awkward silence followed. Kiku himself broke it:

"But I do not know what is with you and your weird all-male family that I just could not help getting attached emotionally to you all. It almost feels like I fell for my own trap. My somewhat submissive behavior used to be on purpose, but now I do not know how I should act around you at all. Even though I get easily embarrassed by your behavior that differs greatly from my people's, I cannot help thinking that Peter will miss my stories, I cannot help thinking that Tino will be sad to do all the chores by himself again, I cannot help thinking that Tino's sadness is going to make Berwald seriously worried, I cannot help thinking that you are going to be devastated if I leave. I just cannot help thinking about all the damage I am going to do to you and your happy family if I leave."

Kiku was slowly reaching for the doorknob when Arthur caught it.

"If that worries you that much, why are you going to leave?"

Kiku gulped and tried to reach for it again.

"I have to."

"Why?"

"Sunshowers."

"What do they have to do with you?"

"When it sunshowers, it means a kitsune is getting married. I am the only kitsune here in England, which means the next sunshower here is surely going to be my own wedding ceremony. Then I will have to leave. I do not want to make this more painful than it should, even for me myself. I have to leave before I get even more emotionally attached to you. I should have done this several weeks ago without telling anyone. Now, would you please let me leave?"

Kiku was trying hard not to cry, Arthur could tell, even though he had thought foxes didn't cry.

Well, Kiku tried, but failed. There soon were a few tears rolling down his cheeks. He mumbled a few words in his native language, and then whispered:

"I should not have stayed for so long in human form… I now have human feelings and human morality… What am I going to do?…"

Seeing his beloved Nipponese cry, suddenly something clicked in Arthur's mind.

"You don't have to leave until it sunshowers. And if it never sunshowers, you'll never have to leave."

"What kind of logic makes you believe it will never sunshower again?"

"None."

"Then what are you trying to convince me of?"

"That just because someday you may have to leave, it doesn't mean you have to leave now. And as you've just said, you've become more human than this 'kitsune' thing. I can get help from some magicians in the neighboring village to make you completely human."

"How do you know they will be able to deal with Nipponese mythical creatures?"

"Trust me, they've even summoned Russian humans, there's nothing they can't do. Don't worry, we'll be fine, you'll be fine."

Kiku seemed to understand Arthur's point and decided to give him a chance. He had nothing to lose, right? Finally turning around, the Nipponese sighed and said:

"You can try, but if anything happens to me, be sure that I will make your life a living hell. Do not doubt me, I have not shown all of my abilities."

Arthur suddenly hugged the Nipponese man, who immediately started blushing heavily.

"W-what are you doing, Kirkland-san?"

"Cut out this 'Kirkland-san' bullshit. You know you don't need to be so formal."

"…"

"What the bloody hell were you thinking while you were trying to leave?"

"I was attempting to retain some dignity, but I sincerely think there is nothing I can do about it now. It does not sound as important as before. And please watch your language… Arthur-san."

"Still calling me with this weird '-san'? Well, at least you're saying my name…"

Arthur then smiled mischievously. Kiku did not let it pass.

"What are you intending to do, Arthur-san?"

"You're way too uptight, Kiku. We'll just have a little fun."

"W-what?"  
As Arthur playfully touched Kiku's back (and made Kiku blush heavier and heavier), he said:  
"Aw, come on, don't tell me you don't know about this!"

"W-We are both men, Arthur-san!"  
"As if I cared!"

"B-but we may wake Peter-kun, Väinämöinen-san and Oxenstierna-san up!"

"They didn't wake up with your shouting before; do you really think you're going to scream louder now? Oh my, are you a screamer, Kiku?"

"I-I will end up draining your vital energy if you do this to me!"

"You talk like you couldn't control it. Come on, what are you afraid of?"  
As Arthur got more and more daring and Kiku got more and more flustered, the taller slowly guided the Nipponese towards the bed and then pinned him down. Kiku was blushing so heavily Arthur even wondered how he hadn't passed out yet. He decided to tease the shorter man a bit more.

"Ah, and Kiku?"

Kiku tried to answer, even though he was already focusing on not freaking out:

"W-what, Arthur-san?"

Arthur smirked. How could a man be so cute? Anyway, he had to say something before poor Kiku passed out:  
"If everything goes wrong and the magicians can't turn you a human completely, Peter will have to forgive me, but I'll hope it never sunshowers again!"

Then, the blonde held Kiku's chin with one hand, raised his head and gave him a kiss. Now, he was quite sure the shorter man had actually fainted.

Well, it couldn't be helped. It was still too much for him. However, Arthur was quite happy to realize that he probably wasn't going to regret what he had done earlier that night as he had feared before.

—

I could spend hours and hours talking about side notes, but I think I'll just put the ones I find absolutely necessary:

\- The whole chouchin and kouban thing is based on a tale called "Kitsune no Chouchin" ("The Fox's Paper Lamp"). A hardworking younger brother finds himself lost in the woods and gets a chouchin from a fox, only to discover that when he shakes it, kouban (old Japanese gold coins) fall from the lamp. His greedy older brother goes after the same fox and demands for it to give him two lamps, but the chouchin makes small yellow flowers bloom instead of making koban appear. Yes, it sounds a lot like "Hanasaka Jiisan" ("The Old Man Who Made the Dead Trees Blossom"), but it was the best I could find (in fact, I tried asking a few relatives for cute kitsune stories, but turns out they like tanuki stories more). I just changed Kiku's appearance because if Arthur saw a walking fox from the start, he probably wouldn't be able to keep it a secret. Chouchin are those Japanese paper lamps commonly used in festivals and Koban is that gold coin Meowth from Pokémon has on its head. There's also an explicit reference to the "Kitsune no Yomeiri" tale, but I think this one is much more known.

\- Everybody in the story calls Japan "Nippon" and Japanese "Nipponese" because they simply do not know the world "Japan" or "Japanese". Although it's not clear, the story is set during Sakoku (isolationist Japan), mid 18th century, so it's quite obvious they've never heard of it. Finally, Kiku only knows "Nippon" (okay, and "Cipang") because his native language is Japanese and so the only name for his land he knows is in Japanese.

\- When Peter says Tino's made Swedish food, it's actually Finnish food. As I've stated before, the story is set during the 18th century, so Finland was still part of Sweden. But both Tino and Berwald are from what nowadays is Finland (in fact, I was going to add a comment that Tino seemed to see the connection between "tanuki" and "raccoon dog", but raccoon dogs apparently weren't introduced in Europe prior to the 20th century, so…).

\- Kiku's habit of saying "-kun" comes from the fact that he'd feel strange to call Peter only "Peter". Similarly, since he says "-kun", it would be weird for him not to say "-san", so that's why he still uses them even while speaking English. Kiku does not contract any words (like using 'm for am) because I thought it would be a good way to convey his politeness.

\- Kiku's inhuman hability to learn languages and how to cook comes… Well, from the fact that he's a fox. I almost made him a nine-tailed fox, but then again, I don't think he'd have that internal conflict if he were one. His story about how he got to England is true, but he spent almost the entirety of those times as a fox and simply decided to stay at the Netherlands because he wanted to. Also, his feminine frame as a human comes from the fact that he had only transformed into young women before (if he had transformed into men, they'd be old ones), so it's kind of confusing to him to transform into young men. And I didn't make Kiku turn into a woman as a human simply because I didn't want to. Finally, he has small personal space because of Japan's high population density - apparently, it's been high for centuries. And higher population densities seem to lead to smaller personal spaces.

\- As for Arthur's unusual calmness over discovering he's bi, let's say a thing: religion at those times was closely related to social life. Since the Kirklands lived quite isolated from society, it would make sense for them not to care much about religion, and social pressure wouldn't affect them that much. I only put Tino's obssession over Christmas because I find it cute and also because, well, it's not impossible to like a particular holiday, right? It was already celebrated during the 18th century, so…

Anyway, thank you for taking the time to read this!


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